1. Field of the Invention
The invention lies in the field of conveyor technology and relates to a conveyor device according to the preamble of the independent patent claim. The conveyor device serves for conveying flat objects in conveyor compartments, in which in each case a flat object or in each case a plurality of flat objects stacked on one another, are conveyed lying on a support surface.
2. Description of Related Art
Conveyor methods, in which flat objects or stacks of such objects are conveyed in conveyor compartments lying on support surfaces are known, for example, in the field of further processing of printed products, in particular for the creation of printed product groups by way of collation. Thereby, the conveyor compartments are conveyed along a series of feed locations, and at each feed location, a printed product is fed essentially to each conveyor compartment, and deposited on the support surface of the conveyor compartment or on printed products which already lie or are stacked on this support surface, so that essentially the same stacks of printed products in all conveyor compartments are conveyed downstream of the last feed location. These stacks are then usually transferred to a following further conveyor device or to a processing device.
The Swiss patent application No. 0118/06 discloses a conveyor device, with which the conveyor method briefly described above may be carried out. This conveyor device comprises conveyor compartments which revolve on a closed path, for example on a conveyor member revolving along the path, and which are pivotable about an axis aligned transversely to the conveyor path, in a manner such that, for example, the spatial orientation of the support surfaces may be retained with a changing path course, or that the support surfaces may have different inclination angles relative to a horizontal, in different regions of the revolving path.
It is then the object of the invention, to create a further conveyor device with conveyor compartments, wherein the conveyor compartments comprise support surfaces, on which flat objects or stacks of flat objects may be conveyed in a lying manner. Thereby, an inclination angle of the support surfaces relative to the conveyor path should be able to be set in a controlled manner, and, as the case may be, it should also be possible to hold the objects on the conveyor surfaces during the conveying, such that a conveying is possible with alignments of the support surfaces, with which the gravitational force of the objects is not sufficient to hold these on the support surfaces. Despite this, the device should be able to be realised in a simple manner and be able to be controlled in a simple manner.